The $300 PC

[pschmid]

You get what you pay for, right? But what happens if you build a PC on the cheap? We packed two boxes with low-cost AMD and Intel CPUs and other inexpensive components. Guess who dominates the low end?

 

[carver_g]

First, I think Tom's Hardware is a great website and I've been surfing it for years. Packed with useful and interesting information.

That said, this article is really odd. It's titled "the $300 PC" but about halfway through, they basically say that "you can't build a futureproof PC for $300 so we didn't." But then the article says in the end that if you skimp on some components, then yes, you can get under $300. So why didn't you? That's the title of the article!

Also, the benchmarks aren't what you get if you buy the listed components, because the video benchmarks aren't even done with the specified WD 160GB Hard Drive. They're done with a raptor!

 

[finaltable]

This article really reveals what a pricing advantage the big resellers have. Right now one can purchase from Dell for $349 a system with a Sempron 3400+, 512MB of RAM, a 80 GB HDD, a DVD-ROM and Vista Basic.

I know people have their gripes about Dell (or any other other mfr) but given that this is a look at cheap (not best) systems and the THG solution doesn't include the cost for OS the economies of scale become very clear on the lowest end.

 

[Bungsta]

I'd also like to point out that in terms of fairness, the Intel system cost $26 more than the AMD system, and it was pointed out that the AMD system could have had an athlon 64 3200+ for only $10 more. This would have still put the AMD system at $16 less than the Intel one, and offered superior performance.

How much did Intel pay to have this 11 page ad for obsolete netburst processors?



P.S. I agree with carver_g, the benchmarks are misleading since the actual system wasn't used, possibly fooling some users into thinking they'll be getting better performance than they really will due the inclusion of the 150gb raptor. This drive alone costs more than half of the price of the test systems, and it's inclusion is unwarranted.

 

[quasarsky]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813135039

this is the motherboard you should have chosen. it has integrated 6100 graphics. a much better choice than what you chose. and its about ~53 bucks.

i can't believe the choice you made for amd.

 

[zavinac]

They say "at least 350 W", but such a basic system cannot even draw 100 W.

Something wrong with the power supplies, I sense.

 

[quasarsky]

Actually here is an even sweeter deal. You get case, mobo, and power supply for one low price. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16856167009

OMG. you can get at ewiz a 3800x2 am2 for about 100 bucks and 2 gigs of ddr2 667 ram for about 120 bucks. so bascially a 2 gig dual core machine with case and psu for about the same price of "going over" as this article. ugh. i hate articles like these.

yes i know those deals won't always be that cheap but still. the prices for the system they built here won't remain static either.

http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?p=T6UX2GC5&c=fr ram
http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?p=A64-3800CU&c=fr&pid=246fa9e73054ac5f519b0bbba40181437808af387fe732b01f835b23e97b01c0 cpu

comes out to about ~$310 total before shipping. absurd.

 

[asgallant]

You might be able to knock this test setup down that low, if you went with an 80 GB hd instead of the 160, 512 MB ram instead of 1GB, generic components instead of name brand, and an OEM copy of vista basic. Just pulling stuff off NewEgg today (avoiding any sales) yields:

Sempron 3400: $76
512 MB DDR2 667: $40
PC CHips AGG3 Motherboard w/ integrated graphics: $47
80 GB WD800JD HDD: $44
LG dvd rom: $18
Cheapo case: $10
generic 350-400 watt PS: $20
Vista Home Basic OEM: $90

Total cost: $345

Shop around and you can find stuff cheaper (maybe save $10-20 and buy a cheapo case w/ a cheapo 400 watt PS). I know some of you will say that cheapo PS's and cases are crap, and I would agree (I would never use them personally), but the components Dell uses aren't much better, which is how they can afford to charge so little for them (in addition to the economies of scale factors in bulk purchases and mass production).

 

[rodney_ws]

If you're looking for a very basic computing experience, it's absolutely impossible to beat the big boys (Dell primarily). I think this "$300" PC review proved that... that PC lacked a monitor and an OS. However, once you start adding options (upgraded video, sound, etc) it quickly becomes a coin flip in terms of value. Once you're in the $2000+ range for a system, building it yourself is definitely a financially attractive option if you're willing to live without a unified warranty.

 

[fep_coder]

As an experienced budget builder, I can tell you that you are going about it all wrong. In this morning's paper, there is an ECS GeForce 6100SM-M and Athlon 64 X2 5000+ combo for $99.99.

That's how you start a budget build. With a loss lead from XXX's Electronics. Then you add a sale-priced video card, like that XFX GeForce 7600GS that I saw on YYY.com for $50 after rebate. The key is to pickup almost every item on sale. Then stuff them into a medium or better quality free after rebate case (which you might have to get the day after Thanksgiving).

You have to remember that there is almost no other place besides computers where the item that you buy depreciates so rapidly. Where else can you spend hundreds or thousands and your purchase is guaranteed to be junk in three years. So, it's only smart to spend wisely. Compare this to good hand or power tools where you can pass them down to your grandkids.

 

[quasarsky]

OMG link to that board and cpu?

 

[desolationw]

it was pointed out that the AMD system could have had an athlon 64 3200+ for only $10 more

In the UK, a 3200 costs the same as the sempron listed at £50 and an asus brand am2 motherboard is £35 so i don't think the best choices were made.

Is it just me or are tom's articles losing the quality they once had?

 

[asgallant]

If you're looking for a very basic computing experience, it's absolutely impossible to beat the big boys (Dell primarily). I think this "$300" PC review proved that... that PC lacked a monitor and an OS. However, once you start adding options (upgraded video, sound, etc) it quickly becomes a coin flip in terms of value. Once you're in the $2000+ range for a system, building it yourself is definitely a financially attractive option if you're willing to live without a unified warranty.

I beg to differ; I took 30 minutes and found a system that costs less than the cheapest Dell desktop with components that are about the same quality or better than what Dell offers. Dell overprices just about every single upgrade to the base system, so if you want higher performance stuff, you will pay *way* more than the price of each individual component than you would if you built it yourself. Not to mention that the quality of components on the market is higher than what Dell offers, and the warranties are almost universally better. Most components come with 3 year warranties, which would cost a huge chunk of change to get from Dell.

The only reason to buy from a big builder like Dell is if you can't, won't, or don't want to build it yourself. There is no savings in money.

 

[Chinky714]

As an experienced budget builder, I can tell you that you are going about it all wrong. In this morning's paper, there is an ECS GeForce 6100SM-M and Athlon 64 X2 5000+ combo for $99.99.

That's how you start a budget build. With a loss lead from XXX's Electronics. Then you add a sale-priced video card, like that XFX GeForce 7600GS that I saw on YYY.com for $50 after rebate. The key is to pickup almost every item on sale. Then stuff them into a medium or better quality free after rebate case (which you might have to get the day after Thanksgiving).

You have to remember that there is almost no other place besides computers where the item that you buy depreciates so rapidly. Where else can you spend hundreds or thousands and your purchase is guaranteed to be junk in three years. So, it's only smart to spend wisely. Compare this to good hand or power tools where you can pass them down to your grandkids.

the $99 AM2 X2 is a price mistake. It's actually $199.99 those who went to frys yesterday and tried to get it was shot down. Also, how many people have a Frys close to them? so only west coast and mid us can build budget systems? East coast users don't have this deal, as there is no frys near them.

 

[Sevren]

As an experienced budget builder, I can tell you that you are going about it all wrong. In this morning's paper, there is an ECS GeForce 6100SM-M and Athlon 64 X2 5000+ combo for $99.99.

8O

 

[smithule]

The truth is, for the same price as either of their setups you can build an X2 3800 or other system that would blow either of those away. This article is very pointless.

If you want to build a budget system this is not the way to do it.

 

[caamsa]

I would say that if you are going to go this cheap just pick up a computer from bestbuy, compusa or dell. A lot of times after rebates you can get a pretty decent system for about (more or less) $300.00 bucks after rebates and at least you get a monitor and printer..........

 

[asgallant]

As an experienced budget builder, I can tell you that you are going about it all wrong. In this morning's paper, there is an ECS GeForce 6100SM-M and Athlon 64 X2 5000+ combo for $99.99.

That's how you start a budget build. With a loss lead from XXX's Electronics. Then you add a sale-priced video card, like that XFX GeForce 7600GS that I saw on YYY.com for $50 after rebate. The key is to pickup almost every item on sale. Then stuff them into a medium or better quality free after rebate case (which you might have to get the day after Thanksgiving).

Exactly. A real budget build takes time to assemble. I spent 5 months putting together a super low cost system for my aunt. All she does is browse the internet and send a few emails (and she does so little of it that all she needs is a 56kbps dialup internet connection). Shuffling through bargain bins, sales, and rebate programs, I was able to put together a complete system (I think it was an AMD K6-II 450 mHz or something - we're talking slow here) including monitor and printer (purchased used) and OS (Win 98) for under $150.

 

[k61824]

call it a hunch but if the goal is to built cheap PC's won't we save money by using free OS (linux/BSD) instead of Windows?
(suggestion: get some feature-rich distro of linux (relatively speaking) to do the benchmarks, and raise the budget because you don't need to stick to windows)

Edit: You can still say the hardware is Vista ready, but just that you are not going to install Vista until you get rich.

(not that I am a fanboy of windows or linux, but linux does cost a lot less (None/cost of media compared to ~$100 US for XP MCE/XP Home/Vista Home basic and more for more premium editions of Vista) from a constrained budget point of view)

As to the "on sale" part, yes, you might want to catch almost everything on sale, BUT we have to have the scope that at least you can buy it at local places (which mean you don't have these things on sale all the time unless you check on the online retailers). Remember they don't necessarily have the day after thanksgiving sale outside the US.

speaking of which if there is some comp who ships worldwide we might want to test the build against their cheapest configurations

 

[3Ball]

lol, Intel didnt pay Toms to advertise for them a $50 netburst processor. lol wheres ur head at man, lets stay within the bounds of realism here. It would boast no gains for Goliath. lmao

Best,

3Ball

 

[CompTIA_Rep]

Ya, well if I had $300 to spend I would check the adds for big name stores and pick up a computer with warranty and all the software I need.


Example: 5 second search:

Processor Class: Celeron D Processor
Processor Number: 356
Processor Speed: 3.33 GHz
Front Side Bus: 533 MHz
L2 Cache Size: 512 KB
Memory Speed: PC2-4200 (533MHz)
Memory Type: DDR2-SDRAM
Installed Memory: 512 MB
Memory Slots Total: 2
Memory Slots Available: 1
Hard Drive Capacity: 120 GB
Drive Controllers: SATA-300
Rotational Speed: 7200 RPM

$329 at Compsua

If your on this tight of a budget, Playing Oblivion on max is not your goal, rather its having a reliable computer that does what you want.

 

[joefriday]

Great article! It's about damn time we get to see just a little bit of Cedar Mill Celeron D. However, I'm deeply saddened that no overclocking was performed. Both of those processors had room to overclock. I want to see power consumption of the Celeron D at 4.8GHz!

I see lots of folks here are crying foul, but it's a moot point. I could have built either one of those two systems cheaper. There have already been plenty of good suggestions for building a cheaper AMD rig, so I'll help make Intel more cost effective:
A $95 Asus mobo? Are you frickin insane? You could have saved $35 by going with the Asrock DUAL-VSTA and been just as future proof. No integrated graphics, but the $35 saved could have purchased a Geforce 6200TC, much better than any current IGP. If you want the best perfromance/dollar, Fry's sells an E4300 and an ECS mobo combo for $150 (only $5 more than your mobo/cpu selection), which would have wiped the floor with AMD at this price point. If you wanted to match (or beat) the price of the AMD built, it's not hard to do. Buying this ECS mobo over the Asus would have put you at $326 for the Intel build.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813135043

Also, I SERIOUSLY doubt the effectiveness of 1GB of ram vs 512MB. I challenge THG to rerun their benchmarks with just 512MB. I'm confident the performance difference between 1GB and 512MB will be next to nothing. In fact if you would have just used a single 512MB stick of ram, you would have made your $300 budget of BOTH AMD and Intel (using the mobo I suggested).

 

[joefriday]

Exactly. A real budget build takes time to assemble. I spent 5 months putting together a super low cost system for my aunt. All she does is browse the internet and send a few emails (and she does so little of it that all she needs is a 56kbps dialup internet connection). Shuffling through bargain bins, sales, and rebate programs, I was able to put together a complete system (I think it was an AMD K6-II 450 mHz or something - we're talking slow here) including monitor and printer (purchased used) and OS (Win 98) for under $150.

How long ago was that? I built the rig in my signature for $5 a year and a half ago (had to buy the CPU, all the rest was scavenged junk thrown out by people). It took me 6 months to come up with all the parts.

 

[Bungsta]

lol, Intel didnt pay Toms to advertise for them a $50 netburst processor. lol wheres ur head at man, lets stay within the bounds of realism here. It would boast no gains for Goliath. lmao

Best,

3Ball

I was just being sarcastic to illustrate the point that they favored Intel in the article, when the article explicitly states that they could have had a superiour AMD processor while still spending less than they did on the Intel system. For a fair analysis, they should have evened the budgets for each system. I build budget systems for people quite frequently, and time after time the low end Athlon 64 is the best bang for the buck, and even if it costs a couple dollars more, the performance difference from the Celerons is noticeable even to casual users.

 

[elpresidente2075]

Also, I SERIOUSLY doubt the effectiveness of 1GB of ram vs 512MB. I challenge THG to rerun their benchmarks with just 512MB. I'm confident the performance difference between 1GB and 512MB will be next to nothing.

All I will say about that is that its obvious that you haven't experienced the difference for yourself. Trust me, it is a very very large difference.

And for people who aren't going to upgrade their systems majorly in the next year or two or three (which happens to be people who spend 300 bucks on a system in my experience), going with a 939 AMD setup would be fine. You can still get PCI-E, but you get a reduced cost feature set. The 939 A64 3200's are only $49 at Newegg, and you can get a really nice 939 board for real cheap these days. Not to mention, DDR ram will be a bit cheaper soon, and right away you have much more performance for the exact same money. Sure, you won't be able to upgrade the processor in 24 months, but how many people, when faced with that situation and that have that capability, actually do upgrade their processors?

I rest my case.